You're My Person
by AllyKat88
Summary: Based on the prompt: 'If I murder someone, you are the person I'd call to help me drag the body across the floor. You're my person.' Also inspired vaguely by The First Time. Three times that Lydia's completely in love with Stiles and the one time he's completely in love with her. Canon-divergent.


Hi all! Firstly a huge thank you for your overwhelming response on my other one shot, Daddy Issues. If you haven't read that and you like this, feel free to give it a look and my other work too.

I've been wanting to write a really angsty one shot for awhile. This was inspired partially by the movie The First Time so for those of you that have seen that you might recognise some bits of dialogue from that. If you haven't seen it and you're a Dylan fan, you are missing out.

This was also written for the prompt: If I murder someone, you are the person I'd call to help me drag the body across the floor. You're my person.

Enjoy and let me know what you think!

Lydia always knew that she was going to die like this. She knew it would be agonisingly slow and undoubtedly before her time. She knew it would start with a clenching in her chest that stole her breath away. Admittedly, she's always assumed it might be a heart attack, or one too many tequila's, but instead here she is, watching Stiles Stilinski wrap his fingers around Malia's hair, and she knows, she's all but dead already.

He's beautiful, in the worst kind of way. Lydia knows she's beautiful too and beautiful people herd together, right? So why wasn't he twisting his fingers around her hair? She already knows the answer. He isn't Jackson, or Aiden, or...she can't even remember the names of all the others. She knows that she can walk into the cafeteria any time and find another chiselled jaw to admire. He'll be rich, adequately dreamy and after a date and a few drinks she'll probably let him take her home with him.

In the morning, once she's home and showered, she'll tell herself she wasn't easy, even when she knows it isn't true.

She's ruined for all of that now. She can't find what she's looking for in the cafeteria or on the lacrosse field. Stiles was usually in the library, pouring over any book that might explain the unexplainable.

So, no, maybe his smile isn't always the straightest. Maybe he's lean and sinewy instead of broad. And maybe he smells like soap and deodorant and something just _Stiles_. She's tired of gagging on Hugo Boss anyway. And maybe, just maybe, he'll be the first person to make her fall apart before he pulls her back together.

For now, he's still loving _her._

For the first time, he's completely unaware of her presence. He doesn't know that she's really just a shell, held up by bones locked in place, and her insides are lying in shattered pieces at her feet. The tip of his nose skims over Malia's neck. He whispers something into her hair. Checks the halls are free of teachers and nips at her ear.

Lydia thinks she might be sick.

She clamps a hand over her mouth and turns on her heel, Malia's laughter ringing in her ears. She freezes when she hears him call her name. She sends a silent 'thank you' to the universe that he shouts it like an after thought, like he wouldn't have even bothered if he didn't feel like he had to. There are times when he says it like she's water and he's on fire. On other days he might whisper it to her with a hand on her cheek and it's so tender, so intimate that Lydia thinks she might spontaneously combust.

She doesn't respond as she hears Malia tell him to, 'just leave her,' and instead flees towards her next class, the sound of her heels clacking echoing in her wake.

...

She prays that it's Stiles that answers the door. She's not sure she can handle explaining why she's standing on Sheriff Stilinski's front porch at 2am in her pyjamas. She muses that it always seems to rain when a fugue episode strikes. Maybe it was supposed to be ironic, although she couldn't seem to figure out how. Nevertheless, if it wasn't raining she wouldn't feel as self conscious about the transparency of her t-shirt.

She knocks again and wonders if she should call him instead of waking up the rest of the street but it doesn't matter in the end. As she raises her fist to knock again she sees the lights flick on in the hallway and the jangle of keys tinkles like a balm on her frayed nerves.

Lydia's not sure what she was expecting him to look like but it wasn't this. He looks younger somehow, less troubled despite the sleepy confusion furrowing his brows. He's ditched the flannel shirt for plaid pyjama bottoms and a t-shirt. Lydia almost smiles at the choice. He's still true to himself, even when he's asleep, she thinks. Surprisingly, it's endearing, dependable and even illicit she decides when he reaches up to scratch the back of his neck. She forces herself to raise her eyes from the flash of skin the movement reveals above his waistband.

"Lydia? Jesus, you must be freezing; get in here," he says to her amazement and steps aside hurriedly.

And just like that, she's already bypassed at least four steps of her plan and in all honesty she feels a little dizzy with the speed of it all. She'd expected to at least have to explain herself, but he simply eyes her tiredly and says, "My dad's at the station. You can, er, do you want to change?"

Lydia looks down at herself and nods slowly.

Did she want to change? He's talking about her clothes but she finds the question lays her soul bare. She wants to be the Lydia that he sees. She wants to be the fun, smart Lydia that he wanted to dance with so desperately. Being that Lydia meant being a new, shiny Lydia that was selfless, brave, and kind. Although she isn't sure if she's completely mastered those yet.

She thinks back to the way he smiled when Malia laughed at his joke at lunch. Lydia had seen his cheeks colour when they locked eyes and Malia bit into her apple suggestively. He hadn't even noticed that Lydia developed a sudden case of a headache and excused herself.

"You're in love with her, aren't you?" Lydia says suddenly as Stiles begins to fidget with the hem of his t-shirt. "Malia," she clarifies. The name almost gets stuck in her throat.

His hands still and he looks up at her like she's just announced she has a second head. Lydia wraps her fingers together anxiously, eyes trained on her bare feet. She notices that her nail polish is chipped and there's dirt between her toes from the walk to his house. She wonders if she should tell him it really was a fugue state that bought her to his door or her own madness. She could have turned back when she'd found herself in his garden. She didn't have to knock. Either way she decides perhaps they're passed the point where it matters.

Stiles lets out a long breath and scratches the back of his head.

"Honestly?" His eyes glance up to meet hers. She wishes he would turn away so that she wouldn't drown in their sincerity again.

"No, lie to me," she whispers instead and gives him a small smile.

If he's aware of the way her heart is hammering against her ribs, he doesn't show it.

"Honestly, I don't know." He averts his gaze as he says it and Lydia knows he does it out of guilt.

Guilt felt by anyone else wouldn't be nearly as endearing, but with Stiles, it's a constant reminder that he's the best person she knows. He feels guilty for things he hasn't even done, the same way that she feels guilty when he creeps into her dreams at night. If only he knew how guilty she felt for thinking she could tear him away from Malia and yet she was going to anyway. Because underneath the perfect hair and ditsy head tilts she really was just as selfish as everyone thought she was.

Telling him how she felt had gone beyond hoping he still loved her; it had become a matter of self preservation. The preservation of her own sanity, that is.

"Why are you here, Lydia?" Stiles says after a while. His eyes are wide with worry and Lydia realises she's been staring at a spot on the wall behind him for almost two minutes.

Her confession was crawling up her throat like a banshee scream. She can feel it on the tip of her tongue pushing it's way through her teeth until it burst into the air in a rush.

"If I need someone to talk to, you're the first person I call. If I find a dead body, you're the person I call. When I can't sleep. When my Dad lets me down. When I just miss Allison to much. It's always you. If I murder someone, you are the person I'd call to help me drag the body across the floor. You're my person, Stiles. You're the one who always figures it out. You're the one who drags me out of bed three times a week like some kind of supernatural metal detector. Except you don't any more, because you're with her. You're not mine any more." She goes quiet and after a moment, "Maybe you never were," she says almost to herself.

The slow slackening of his jaw is the only sign that he's heard her. He seems to struggle for the right words before finally giving up and he lets out a pathetic, "what?"

Lydia sighs and shakes her head tiredly. Somehow now it's out it seems tedious to even explain any more. Surely he should understand? She was sure it must be evident on her face, in every movement of her body that whispers _Stiles, Stiles, Stiles._

"Why did you stop looking when I started looking?" she whispers and before he can say another word she's already out of the door, her feet squelching in the mud as she darts across the grass. She doesn't stop running until she can no longer hear him shouting her name.

...

If she's deluded to think that he still loves her, she doesn't care. The fates can write it on her headstone, whisper it into the air with her ashes, tattoo it all over her body if they want to. Lydia bites her lip habitually as Stiles pulls away, the spider he's plucked from her hair dangling between his fingers. He swats it away as it wriggles and slides down its web in a desperate attempt to escape.

"There," he says tenderly and shuffles back to sit beside her. "Spider free again."

Lydia sighs and drops her head back against the wooden boards of Stiles' playhouse. They're faded from the sun and beginning to mould from lack of use but the house is still standing and she supposes that's a sign that even simple things can survive the years.

She's sure she's sat in it before at some birthday party or other when they were children. She's also sure that Stiles would probably tell her exactly what day it was if she asked but she doesn't mention it. They sit in silence for awhile until Stiles taps his foot against Lydia's.

"Hey, do you remember my eighth birthday..." Lydia smiles.

She smiles until he drops his hands back onto his knees as if he's exhausted from spinning his tale of Scott and the killer bumble bee. He grins at her one last time before the furrow between his brows returns. She thinks it might even be deeper now. The way it lines his forehead makes her want to reach out and smooth it like a wrinkle in her skirt.

He falls silent again. He drums his hand nervously against her leg until she edges away and he murmurs, "sorry."

"Why are you hiding in here?" Lydia says after Stiles' third heavy sigh.

He glances at her out of the corner of his eye.

"How long have you been waiting to ask that?" He finishes with a small chuckle but Lydia thinks it sounds more nervous than resigned.

"Will that change the answer?" she counters immediately.

She shifts imperceptibly until his arm is no longer burning a hole in hers. She doesn't know how he does it, this unassuming boy that wants nothing and yet somehow gives her everything, but every time his skin touches hers she's engulfed by fire that burns hotter that her hair.

Stiles runs a hand over his face and shakes his head.

"Malia's coming over to get some of her things," he says sheepishly.

Lydia nods slowly.

"And that's a problem because you still love her?" she surmises. She ignores the way her heart squeezes when she says it.

In the darkness she thinks she's sees him stiffen when her tongue trips slightly over the word 'love.' She's often considered how so much can be simplified into such a small word. Four simple letters. No mathematical equations or hypothesis which is what it felt like to Lydia. Looking at Stiles felt like standing in front of a chalk board full of numbers and letters in her handwriting. She knows she's done all the working out but she still can't find the answer. She has the same feeling holed up in Stiles' bedroom at two in the morning starring at his mystery board and coming up blank. He's usually fallen asleep by then with his head lolling over the back of the chair and his mouth hanging open and again Lydia questions the emotion that makes her want to stroke his hair off of his face instead of roll her eyes.

Stiles has crawled to the entrance of the play house. He sticks his head out carefully before darting back inside with a whispered, "she's in the kitchen."

He settles himself down beside her again, back resting tiredly against the plastic wall.

"I don't think I'm in love with her. I thought I knew what being in love was like before Malia and now it just all looks like a big mess. I mean, I'm sat out here hiding from her with you and God, Lydia, you were right." He shifts his body to face her. "You were. I was such a jackass to you."

He shakes his head and opens his mouth to speak again but Lydia cuts him off.

"Maybe," she says honestly and he flinches slightly, "but it's okay. You know, I realised I'd never been in love when Allison asked me to remember what it was like. She said it was like you couldn't breath until you were with them. That you were watching the clock until you saw them again." She pauses, watching for any reaction from Stiles but he doesn't move, he just meets her gaze softly and nods. "Honestly, I don't think I've ever felt like that. Sometimes I feel so nervous about seeing you that I feel sick. It literally makes me want to scream."

She realises her mistake almost immediately.

At first Stiles barely moves. He just sits in silence with his eyes locked on her face. His jaw softens silently. Lydia imagines he can probably see the cogs in her head trying to crank backwards, to turn back time and make him smile gently at her again. Instead he was shaking his head and watching her with that same careful expression he always wears when she's done something decidedly un-Lydia-like.

She wants to tell him everything. She wants him to know how it feels when he brushes her hair out of her eyes without even thinking first. She wants him to know what it's like every time he smiles and it's like a secret, a smile that only she knows. She wants him to know her, more than she even knows herself. Maybe he already does.

Instead she shrugs, tucks her knees up under her chin and says, "You're my person," before she crawls out of the playhouse and jogs back across the grass.

...

She knows she should apologise. Realistically she knows it wasn't really anyone's fault but somehow it felt like she had turned around first.

She had been determined when she woke up this morning. She had told herself that she would walk into school and act like nothing had changed between them. Maybe she'd even kiss him casually, like she had meant to tell him that she loved him, even if it was indirectly. Instead, they'd taken one look at each other and turned in opposite directions.

Now, she she was pacing around her bedroom, rubbing her bruised arm and remembering the startled look in Scott's eyes as she'd collided with his locker in her haste to run away.

It took a moment for her to remember that this was Stiles Stilinski she was thinking about. He's a mess of tangled hair and flailing limbs and horrendous plans that lead nowhere. Or, alternatively, Lydia thinks he's a masterpiece of tousled hair toned, wiry muscles and ingenious thoughts.

She huffs and rolls her eyes.

"Perception," she says aloud into the mirror. Her eyes flit down to her heart and she scowls as if to say, _this is all your fault._

Eventually she decides that actually, he had definitely turned around first.

It takes forty five minutes of pacing to realise she's already running late for school. She grabs her bag wearily and calls goodbye to her Mom on the way out of the door.

"Shit!"

The doors barely closed behind her before the curse slips between her lips, and Lydia glances back to see it click shut behind her.

"I'm sorry," Stiles apologises hurriedly as he steps out onto the driveway in front of her. "I'm sorry," he says again, holding his hands out in front of him like she's a wild lioness.

She shoots him a look of disapproval and his arms drop back to his sides.

"I've been thinking," he announces cautiously. Then he sighs with defeat. "Look, I don't know much about relationships."

Lydia sighs and readjusts her bag on her shoulder.

"Clearly," she bites back and presses her lips together when it comes out harsher than she intended.

She brushes passed him gently when the pleading look in his eyes becomes too much. She can't look back, if she does she'll be ruined. She thrusts her chin up and straightens her shoulders like a barrier against the sound of his breath behind her.

"I definitely don't know anything about love."

Then she has to turn around.

"Look, I don't know how to fix this. Okay, I thought I did but I don't. You're my best friend, Lydia, except when you're not because you know you'll never be just that to me." He pauses and looks up at her through his lashes.

She considers folding her arms and pouting at him angrily. She was going to need anger to get her through the day unless the next words out of his mouth were, 'I love you too,' or, "I just want to be friends.' Either way she wasn't sure if she'd still be standing after he said it.

Instead, because he was Stiles, he didn't say anything like that and really, it was better. He was always better than she expected and it was amazing, really, considering she was expecting a lot already.

He takes a deep breath and seems to regain some semblance of calm. When he eventually speaks again however, he's still wringing his hands together and almost hopping from one foot to the other.

"All I want, like, in the world, is to just keep talking to you," he says firmly. "Okay? I want to know how your day was. I want to know where you want eat, and I want to argue with you. I want to hear all your theories, even the ones that are just completely, you know, wrong. And I know it's not that simple. I just think - " he takes a step towards her hesitantly, " - I really believe that if you'd just be willing to continue having this conversation with me, then we can figure the rest out."

For a moment all Lydia can hear is the sound of her heart pounding in her ears. She blinks before licking her lips nervously.

"You know, none of my theories are actually wrong," she let out hoarsely and pushes a stand of strawberry blonde hair behind her ear. It doesn't feel the same when her own fingers graze her cheek as she does it. Stiles' are always much warmer.

She knows it's not the answer he was hoping for and yet she's still surprised to see him smiling gently as he closes the space between them.

"Every genius has an off day," he whispers before pressing his lips gently against hers.

Kissing him in the boys locker room had been impulsive. They'd barely even moved, Lydia realises suddenly. She'd crushed her lips against his with all the force she could muster and just stayed there until her senses came back to her. She hadn't tasted him, or moulded her lips around his like she was doing now. But somehow that kiss had still been sat in a box at the back of her mind simple labelled, ' _The_ kiss.'

Now the box was open and that kiss, the one that had felt like the best kiss of her short life was overshadowed by the feeling of Stiles' arms sliding around her waist and pulling her closer. She doesn't even flinch when her bag falls off her shoulder onto the gravel. She doesn't notice when the front door opens creaks open behind them and Stiles pulls away.

"You're my person too, Lydia. You always have been."


End file.
